Grinders and strivers and curators, oh my!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Accomplishments are beyond question; motivation is beyond scrutiny. I do not pretend to know or care what motivates people. It’s none of my business and does not affect what I do or how I do it. Either you accomplish or try to judge people on what they intend to do. Sounds like we have too many of the latter in this area, and in this country.

Agree to disagree. IMO, we could encourage the young to care a little less about amassing wealth for its own sake, and a little more about the advancement of society, science, and the environment.

+1000000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's the difference between a guy who cuts the lawn for cash and a landscape architect.

You don't think the landscape architect works hard, strives to be better, curates what they want to develop in their business?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why are any of these terms considered insults? What exactly is wrong with a student who grinds towards their desired college/major/career goal, strives for the best possible outcome, and curates a compelling narrative for decision-makers who control access?

I would argue that the insult lies in the fact that these words capture a kid’s blind ambition, yet are devoid of the student’s intellectual curiosity. The latter is the more essential ingredient to bring to an elite education if one wishes to truly make the most of the opportunity. People who lack this important ingredient waste a limited resource in pursuit of their box ticking ambition.

However, those three words are not offensive to me if the student is also genuinely curious. They are not mutually exclusive, but the combination is becoming rather rare.

It’s really none of ourbusiness. These are inherently subjective judgments that are often completely wrong, and are, in any event, irrelevant. I have seen the full range of personality types while teaching and in practice. Passion is incredibly overrated in terms of predicting eventual success or reliability. Curiosity comes and goes. I have seen hundreds of people over time who professed passion for their field and profession, and could not make challenging professional problems interesting. People with passion often are striving for status, and when the time comes to develop and excel, they simply do not have the tenacity to dig in and truly develop. Conversely, I have seen tons of fairly flat people develop genuine interest and curiosity in their field over time. Quite frankly all of you are insane trying to characterize or judge what a bunch of high schoolers or college kids are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nothing wrong with grinder, it should be applauded. IMO, in the dmv there seems to be this idea that making money for its own sake, without contributing to society, is something that’s acceptable for young people to aim for. That’s what striver and curator means to me.

Oh interesting, I think of “grinder” simply as someone who works hard, “striver” as someone who is trying to be the best they can be, and “curator” as someone who is playing the college admissions game as necessary to succeed.

That's how I see them, too.

FWIW, none of my kids are any of these, but I don't think being like this is a negative. To me, such a person has a goal, and works towards it. That's to be lauded.

I think some people see them as new money vs old money, and don't like that the new money is trying too hard. It's like the old money want to keep their tight circle the way it is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you genuinely not get that there's a difference between a grinder and someone who works really hard because they are genuinely and intrinsically passionate about some cause other than prestige or self-promotion?

I've known both types of students. It can be really hard to tell them apart on the surface. I'm sure admissions committees make mistakes all the tie.

My first gen immigrant parents worked really hard to provide a better quality of life for future generations. They didn’t have the luxury of being “genuinely and intrinsically passionate” about their jobs. It sounds like you would use term “grinder” pejoratively regarding people like them?

Oh, give me a break. I'm actually first gen, both as an immigrant and as the first gen to attend college. And yet I was still raised with values besides caring about money and self-promotion and can tell the difference between a grinder/striver/curator and an intrinsically motivated person with genuine scholarly interests.

You didn’t answer my question. Are my parents bad people because they worked jobs they didn’t love?

No. They cared about YOU presumably, and they worked hard because it was necessary to provide for you, that's great. So did my parents, who worked manual labor jobs despite one having been interested in medicine and the other being interested engineering. If they had the opportunity to go to college, they would have been intrinsically motivated.

But how is this relevant to college admissions? If your kid is intrinsically motivated and works hard, I wouldn't call him/her a grinder/striver/curator. Are you trying to work some sob story about an immigrant history to claim that your own kid with a curated profile and fake interests is just as good as other hardworking applicants who are genuine and passionate? If so, that's not really going to convince me.

Thank you for clarifying, and I apologize for mistaking your meaning. I think we have been talking past each other (easy to do when quickly reading and typing). I am genuinely curious why terms I personally find neutral or even positive are considered by many to be quite negative. I would be the first to call my own DC a grinder (because they work hard to be the best research scientist they can be), striver (because they continually try to improve themselves), and a curator (because they successfully played the college admissions game which will serve as the first stepping stone to an impactful research career in their preferred field). No sob story whatsoever, just honest-to-goodness confusion why people think I’m negging my child when in fact I am super proud of them!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's the difference between a guy who cuts the lawn for cash and a landscape architect.

You don't think the landscape architect works hard, strives to be better, curates what they want to develop in their business?

This discussion is getting rather silly. Let's say we are talking about some saint of a person who donates every last penny to rescue homeless children and animals. Of course we can say "this person works hard, strives to be better, and curates their environment." And yet, we all know this is not the meaning of "grinder/striver/curator" when we are talking about the context of college admissions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you genuinely not get that there's a difference between a grinder and someone who works really hard because they are genuinely and intrinsically passionate about some cause other than prestige or self-promotion?

I've known both types of students. It can be really hard to tell them apart on the surface. I'm sure admissions committees make mistakes all the tie.

My first gen immigrant parents worked really hard to provide a better quality of life for future generations. They didn’t have the luxury of being “genuinely and intrinsically passionate” about their jobs. It sounds like you would use term “grinder” pejoratively regarding people like them?

Oh, give me a break. I'm actually first gen, both as an immigrant and as the first gen to attend college. And yet I was still raised with values besides caring about money and self-promotion and can tell the difference between a grinder/striver/curator and an intrinsically motivated person with genuine scholarly interests.

You didn’t answer my question. Are my parents bad people because they worked jobs they didn’t love?

No. They cared about YOU presumably, and they worked hard because it was necessary to provide for you, that's great. So did my parents, who worked manual labor jobs despite one having been interested in medicine and the other being interested engineering. If they had the opportunity to go to college, they would have been intrinsically motivated.

But how is this relevant to college admissions? If your kid is intrinsically motivated and works hard, I wouldn't call him/her a grinder/striver/curator. Are you trying to work some sob story about an immigrant history to claim that your own kid with a curated profile and fake interests is just as good as other hardworking applicants who are genuine and passionate? If so, that's not really going to convince me.

Thank you for clarifying, and I apologize for mistaking your meaning. I think we have been talking past each other (easy to do when quickly reading and typing). I am genuinely curious why terms I personally find neutral or even positive are considered by many to be quite negative. I would be the first to call my own DC a grinder (because they work hard to be the best research scientist they can be), striver (because they continually try to improve themselves), and a curator (because they successfully played the college admissions game which will serve as the first stepping stone to an impactful research career in their preferred field). No sob story whatsoever, just honest-to-goodness confusion why people think I’m negging my child when in fact I am super proud of them!

I see. If your child wants to be a research scientist, I highly doubt they are a striver. This is just not the connotation of the word in most people's minds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nothing wrong with grinder, it should be applauded. IMO, in the dmv there seems to be this idea that making money for its own sake, without contributing to society, is something that’s acceptable for young people to aim for. That’s what striver and curator means to me.

Oh interesting, I think of “grinder” simply as someone who works hard, “striver” as someone who is trying to be the best they can be, and “curator” as someone who is playing the college admissions game as necessary to succeed.

That's how I see them, too.

FWIW, none of my kids are any of these, but I don't think being like this is a negative. To me, such a person has a goal, and works towards it. That's to be lauded.

I think some people see them as new money vs old money, and don't like that the new money is trying too hard. It's like the old money want to keep their tight circle the way it is.

IKR? Old money was once new. Apparently, these people with old money would look down upon their own forebears!

[Anonymous]

“Grinder” is just a re-purposing and a twisting of “on my grind,” which is a phrase popular in Black culture. Just more appropriation.

No, Sally. Having an after-school job at the Wegman’s deli in addition to getting good grades does not mean you are “grinding” anything than perhaps coffee beans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's the difference between a guy who cuts the lawn for cash and a landscape architect.

You don't think the landscape architect works hard, strives to be better, curates what they want to develop in their business?

This discussion is getting rather silly. Let's say we are talking about some saint of a person who donates every last penny to rescue homeless children and animals. Of course we can say "this person works hard, strives to be better, and curates their environment." And yet, we all know this is not the meaning of "grinder/striver/curator" when we are talking about the context of college admissions.

+1. It’s pretty obvious the type of student these terms are reserved for.

[Anonymous]

A striver is a kid whose sole purpose in life is getting ahead. They cultivate no interests for the sake of intellectual curiosity or pure joy. They will solely do an activity because they perceive it as a means to an end. They might truly love swimming but if they think fencing is better for getting into college, that is what they do, even if they hate it. They tend to be miserable people to interact with because they do not consider developing normal social skills to be part of this equation - either they are really geeky nerds, or they are trying to be too cool for school and clearly have an agenda.

Contrary to popular opinion, it is possible to work really hard, do very well in school, and also be a well-rounded, sincere, interesting human being. If it requires all of your energy just to achieve academically and you don't have the bandwidth for the other parts of life, perhaps you aren't that bright after all.

And before anyone jumps down my throat, strivers come from all races, nationalities, genders, etc. I'm Jewish and some of the worst Jews I know are fellow Jews. But, not to generalize as there are many exceptions to this rule, but what made Jews successful in America was their early realization that to truly get ahead here they had to go beyond the stereotype of money hungry and/or bookworms and learn to assimilate and develop other interests and socialization skills.

In sum, I think the key to the negativity of "striver" and "Curator" (I don't think grinder is as bad) is that they reflect a lack of sincerity and a lack of well-roundedness, the former being a bigger problem than the latter.

[Anonymous]

Grinding is great. Athletes and research scientists are the ultimate grinders, just pushing through no matter the difficulty.

The ‘grinder’ on the other hand is taking their 7th period course while at the same time adding mediocre DE courses at night because their parents are pushing for more, more, more. It’s not about passion, it is about a single minded focus on what constitutes merit in their families and communities POV.

Meanwhile, their parents, not understanding the nature of college admissions in the US are screaming and crying about holistic admissions and demanding that nothing but gpa and be considered.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Grinding is great. Athletes and research scientists are the ultimate grinders, just pushing through no matter the difficulty.

The ‘grinder’ on the other hand is taking their 7th period course while at the same time adding mediocre DE courses at night because their parents are pushing for more, more, more. It’s not about passion, it is about a single minded focus on what constitutes merit in their families and communities POV.

Meanwhile, their parents, not understanding the nature of college admissions in the US are screaming and crying about holistic admissions and demanding that nothing but gpa and be considered.

Xenophobic much?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grinding is great. Athletes and research scientists are the ultimate grinders, just pushing through no matter the difficulty.

The ‘grinder’ on the other hand is taking their 7th period course while at the same time adding mediocre DE courses at night because their parents are pushing for more, more, more. It’s not about passion, it is about a single minded focus on what constitutes merit in their families and communities POV.

Meanwhile, their parents, not understanding the nature of college admissions in the US are screaming and crying about holistic admissions and demanding that nothing but gpa and be considered.

Xenophobic much?

NP: I'm not the person you are replying to but I 100% agree. So many immigrants come here and expect the system to adapt to them. Those who do the best are those who learn how the system works and work within it. There are countless ridiculously successful immigrants who do just this. So stop throwing terms like that around without knowing what you are talking about - just making it worse and proving the point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you genuinely not get that there's a difference between a grinder and someone who works really hard because they are genuinely and intrinsically passionate about some cause other than prestige or self-promotion?

I've known both types of students. It can be really hard to tell them apart on the surface. I'm sure admissions committees make mistakes all the tie.

My first gen immigrant parents worked really hard to provide a better quality of life for future generations. They didn’t have the luxury of being “genuinely and intrinsically passionate” about their jobs. It sounds like you would use term “grinder” pejoratively regarding people like them?

Oh, give me a break. I'm actually first gen, both as an immigrant and as the first gen to attend college. And yet I was still raised with values besides caring about money and self-promotion and can tell the difference between a grinder/striver/curator and an intrinsically motivated person with genuine scholarly interests.

The classic example is Isaac Asimov. He was an immigrant kid who grew up running his family’s bodegas, was very hard-working, and was a naturally brilliant person who certainly loved learning for the sake of learning.

And, partly because he was skipped two grades in school, and partly because of antisemitism, he wasn’t even considered good enough to get into the regular Columbia undergraduate college. Columbia stuck him in a junior college that was probably below the level of the modern Columbia general studies college that people here mock.

Most because of antisemitism.